Unfortunately, that story is not uncommon. Unfilled, overfilled or underfilled oil. Stripped or untightened drain plugs, crossthreaded or untightened filters. WalMart oil change: No thanks. Same goes for Jiffy Lube & the like.

Unfortunately, that story is not uncommon. Unfilled, overfilled or underfilled oil. Stripped or untightened drain plugs, crossthreaded or untightened filters. WalMart oil change: No thanks. Same goes for Jiffy Lube & the like.

Had a Dodge dealership overfill the oil in my Dakota by about eight quarts after they replaced the oil pump and released it to me that way. It ran like crap and there was blue smoke coming out the tailpipe on the way home. I took it back and they said it was normal for an old truck.

It ran great before they worked on it.

Eventually they fessed up and said the battery in their oil filler ran low and was over-filling vehicles. They also forgot to plug in a LARGE vacuum line. The mechanic showed 30-years experience on his business card, could have fooled me. Unfortunately the oil pump went out again 30k miles later so I got rid of it.

I'd always changed my own oil and done all repair work on my vehicles prior to that however, I bought my Focus with a service agreement on the D-plan so it was a good deal. If they mess up the car they're responsible.

No shop can make any money doing oil changes for $25-30 bucks, especially dealers, who have higher overhead. They charge that low price to get you in the door in hopes they find another problem that they can charge you for (I'm talking about a legitimate problem here).

So, if you can get it cheap, of course go for it. But to say $50 is getting "ripped off", I disagree because that implies the seller is making a huge, undue profit. Because many shops use the oil change as a loss leader, the higher price is probably not "competitive", but I wouldn't call it a rip-off.

Just so nobody reading through this thread gets the impression that you MUST have your oil changes done at a dealership or oil change facility in order to have the work documented....you can document it yourself simply by keeping the receipts for the oil & filters.

I purchased a small spiral notebook, and each page is a seperate entry for whatever work I've done, with the receipts get stapled to the back of the pages. Documentation done.

The reason I take mine in is so that my oil changes are documented with the dealer so I can prove that they have been done on schedule. That way if I resell it or if a warranty issue comes up my butt is covered. Is it a waste of money? probably

Quote:

Originally Posted by Luki13

This.

And I don't need to dispose of it either or risk making a mess in the driveway. We also don't put a lot of miles on our cars so 2-3 oil changes per year.

2-3 changes per year... the more changes you do, the more you save doing them yourself.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cbdallas

Just so nobody reading through this thread gets the impression that you MUST have your oil changes done at a dealership or oil change facility in order to have the work documented....you can document it yourself simply by keeping the receipts for the oil & filters.

I purchased a small spiral notebook, and each page is a seperate entry for whatever work I've done, with the receipts get stapled to the back of the pages. Documentation done.

Beat me to it.

You don't need to have your dealership or even a professional do your maintenance. Save your receipts and keep a notebook of your work.

I got 3 free changes thrown in by my dealership when I bought the car. They've done one of the three, and they handed me back the car after NOT performing the tire rotation they claimed they would do. I spent 45 minutes driving, and waited for an hour in the waiting room to get a free oil change. I'm not gonna get too excited about paying the dealer $30 with a coupon to get an oil change I can do myself for $20 in 1/3rd the time. Anything other than "free" and I'd be doing them myself if only for the time savings. Disposal is as simple as dropping off the jug at a location that accepts used oil--takes 2 minutes.

I do understand paying someone else if you don't have a driveway or a garage or the know-how, but those are about the only circumstances. Jiffy-type places are tempting for the speed and price, except I'm reluctant to put their oil in my new car that's spec'ed for semi-synthetic.

Another reason to change the oil yourself: my carpool buddy took his CR-V to the dealer for the oil cange. They moved his seat all the way back (just to move it in and out of the bay!) and now he can't get it back just the way it was. Driving him nuts. Ha ha.

But here's an even funnier thing. They charged him a very reasonable $30 for the change, didn't need a rebate or anything like Ford. The oil was only $2.49 a quart (must've used REAL cheap stuff). And I think the concensus is the dealers do that to lure you in and find other stuff that they can upsell you on. But I was looking through his inspection report from them; they noted that his tranny fluid was low, both air filters needed changing, and 2 of his tires were down to 5/32nds. And they didn't even mention it to him. He had no idea until I pointed it out to him (he's pretty spacey - and it's a lease so he doesn't care). So here the dealer charges a low price for the oil change and is probably just breaking even on it at best, and then fails to try to sell him on the stuff they found. Crazy!

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